Context

OpenActive (OA) is a community-led initiative for the sport and physical activity sector. It is run by a community of volunteers, and is backed by grant funding from Sport England and Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), and stewarded by the Open Data Institute (ODI).

The primary use case for OA is to make it easier for people to find and book activities online in the model of other sectors such as travel and fast food.

‘Our aim is to make it as easy to find and book a tennis court as it is to book a hotel room.’

An independent review in 2021 by the Open Data Services Co-operative (ODSC), recommended that OA should:

• ‘explore the alternative value propositions that OpenActive could provide (while maintaining growth for the original ‘find and book’ use cases).’

• ‘engage in ongoing and periodic evaluations of its mission and operational strategy that allow for a shift to more effective and focused approaches in the short-term and for major shifts in activity as required.’

The current OA logic model shows this broader ambition:

Snapshot of full logic model, for more information read; Improving impact: Our approach to monitoring, evaluation and learning

As OA evolves, the initiative wants to refine its approach to achieve greater social impact and meet the needs of a wider range of users. The aim of this framework is to create a consistent approach that any organisation in the OA community can use to more easily identify and collaborate with other organisations sharing similar interests and objectives, and deliver focused use cases that meet the needs of specific users.

Using a common use case framework, including a common approach to Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL), will help to build a shared evidence base for the OA Community, creating alternative value propositions, improving the quality of the data infrastructure and demonstrating the impact of the initiative as a whole.